Day three as an un-led army began with my tired voice addressing a tiny coalition of rogue soldiers.
"I know we're all tired." I paced my room as the sun broke over the horizon, a thin line of light hinting at the time; we'd been up nearly all night. It hadn't taken very long to convince my chosen soldiers to join us, though some hadn't been too happy about being woken after one in the morning. By 2 a.m., all of them had descended on my room. I cursed the fact that the Trifecta were taken on a Sunday night, and we were having to pull this off between classes.
"We only have a little time now to get our plan into action before people start waking up. You all know what to do, who your contacts are. We've already lost two days, so we have to try and pull this off today alone. Remember we are operating outside of the Elite's stupid orders, and have to stay under the radars of both sides, and Corbis."
I glanced at the time display on my phone and grinned, "Let's fuck up their plans, Bitches!" I watched as they split into groups and filtered out of my room, all grinning as excitedly as I was.
Jess hugged my side and nestled her head into my shoulder, "You're kind of terrifying, Babe."
Ashley nodded in agreement, as I pulled her into my other side. "Yeah, who knew you had it in you, Kemper."
-.-
The gaps between classes were punctuated by beeps and buzzes. It was so normal that no one noticed I checked my phone more often than usual.
Got that movie if you wanna borrow it later.
The puppies are already tagged...
If anyone glimpsed my messages, they would appear frivolous. No one would know Eddie's movie was actually a live feed to the security cameras scattered throughout the Academy. Tagged puppies? Tracking devices on the Hellhounds Elite; I'd even gotten a further message saying there were 5 puppies in total. Meaning we would have a constant eye on the Triad, and a couple hangers on. I couldn't wait till I got word that we had a location.
-.-
At lunch, only two of the Triad sat in the dining hall; they'd been rotating at mealtimes for the past few days. From where I sat behind Hadley and Vivienne, I watched Katy and Brian across the hall, cuddled together at their table as they always were. Every once in a while, Eddie's laptop would pull their attention away from each other. They pointed at the screen and made joking comments about what they saw.
In another part of the room, Emma had her back to the wall as she poured over her laptop in much the same way Eddie was doing. For all outward appearances she was watching a movie. I watched in bored interest as her eyes darted across her screen, clearly jumping between multiple screens. Her hand wrapped around her phone absently, and without even looking down at it, she tapped out a message.
When my phone beeped, I wasn't surprised.
I think I know where I'm taking you tonight, can't wait!
I slid the phone to Jess, so she could read the message and we both laughed at how typical I was being. Got a message from a potential date and shared it with my best friend. She raised an eyebrow and grinned into her smoothie as she watched me type out a response.
Send date night coordinates to my driver, E. See you there.
After a moment's thought, I sent a second message to Eddie, the aforementioned "driver".
Fun date location for the lovebirds. I think they'd enjoy it.
Jess leaned against my shoulder and squealed. We were giddy with anticipation. We had a date with backbone tonight, a date with headstrong determination, a date with our own first steps to breaking out of our molds.
-.-
In some semblance of regular activity, I went for a run after classes, joined once again by Jess. We collapsed on the bleachers that edged the soccer field and I pulled my tablet from the band of my tights. Well away from where anyone could hear us, I fiddled till I managed to get a group of contacts together. One by one, my small squad answered the call, each one of them in an area secured from other ears or eyes.
Emma in her car, Rebecca sitting in a knot in the aerial silk that hung in the gymnasium, Katy and Brian in what appeared to be a closet, Mark from the quad where we'd seen him running kata.
"What's going on?" Mark asked excitedly, bouncing on the screen.
"Hi Mark, hi Robert," I greeted the two who'd been for the most part, out of the loop all day. I filled them in quickly, "Last update was that we have a possible location. Any confirmation on that guys?"
"Yuhp!" Eddie barked from the window that focused on the postered wall of his room.
Emma's head nodded in her small square. "Eddie and I have been talking, we cross referenced the location of the trackers with the cameras and have pinpointed our spot. We think Eddie caught one of the incidentals..."
"That was on Becca," he said proudly. "She tagged a couple of people she saw the targets being all secretive with."
"Wasn't hard!" Rebecca piped in. "No one really pays attention!"
"I think I got one of them right before they went to stand guard. I just wish there were cameras closer." Eddie continued what Emma had been trying to say before he cut her off.
"How sure are you guys?" Jess asked, her nervous energy transferring through her gloved hand to mine.
Eddie's grinning face suddenly appeared onscreen. "Pretty damn sure!" He and Emma said at once.
Emma's screen shook and jolted while she turned it, pointing with her stylus. "Here is a layout of Waterbridge, and here is where they are."
"The old gym?!" I exclaimed as everyone else tittered in obvious shock.
"Yuhp," Eddie affirmed. The silence was filled with the pinched, thoughtful expressions of every face on my screen.
The rarely used section of the gymnasium building housed decorations, theater props and costumes, and excess sporting paraphernalia. Only the maintenance crews, a couple of teachers and occasionally students who had permission ever ventured in.
But, it was also directly behind the main building of the school, well in sight of the teacher's quarters and the nightwatchman. Any rescue mission would leave us vulnerable and in the open. It would simply take a janitor looking out a window and we'd be caught.
"Hmm, Emma? Are there any points of entry besides the obvious?"
"I don't know, I've tri-"
"I have an idea." Robert's deep voice interrupted, and sad as it sounds, I had written him off as solely muscle, so his words surprised me. "The sewers."
"What?"
"I remember reading something about the sewers under the school being used as-"
"Oh my God, yeah!" Ashley squealed. "Robert, that's genius! During prohibition, they used to store and run alcohol down there and I'm pretty sure it'll pass right under the gym too!"
There was a rush of typing, which I was more than sure came from Eddie, and we all got a text message with a download of a map.
"It's the most recent map of the sewage lines from the city. It has all entry points, and if we superimpose it over the map of the school we can figure out where we need to be." Eddie beamed out of the screen at us.
"Eddie, remind me to kiss you later!" I joked as I examined the map.
"It better be a good one, and none of that on the cheek shit!" He quipped.
"Maybe. If you get that to me soon. Robert, Mark, Brian, Katy, Becca and myself will be the field team and Jess, Ashley, Emma and Eddie you'll be HQ. Callouts will be sent with coordinates. Enjoy the rest of your evenings, my Rogues."
-.-
In the tunnels, despite my attempts to memorize the map, I lost my way.
"Which way, Hawk-Eye?" I made an attempt at a cutesy nickname like Eddie had been doing in my earpiece as he tracked the group of us from HQ.
"Take the right, Boss-lady." Eddie quipped with his newest one. My field team trudged after me through the dark, damp smelling tunnels, while Eddie at the HQ team were monitoring our progress and the positions of the Hellhounds with all his gadgets and computers.
"Let the Lovebirds go ahead, Killer!" Eddie said suddenly, and I allowed my tiny detonation squad to pass ahead of me.
Katy climbed on Brian's shoulder, eager to set off another tiny explosion like the one she'd set off at the sealed entry point to the tunnels. I watched as she pressed something to the underside of the grate above Brian.
Under the school, we were silent, in case the Hellhounds could hear us. At HQ, Jess whined loudly that Eddie's ever-changing names for me were annoying and I chuckled as it came through my earpiece.
Emma took over the microphone. She split us up; citing the need for distracting the lookouts she sent Becca, Katy and Mark down another tunnel.
Brian, Robert and I waited for what seemed an eternity before Eddie finally spoke again. "Love? Count down for Brian... Three, Two, One."
Brian clicked a control and the tiny explosive caused the grate cover to jolt. The two of them propelled me upwards through the hole. Just outside the room I was in, confusion and cursing exploded along with a string of loud pops, surely caused by Katy and her things that go boom. Where I was, I was sure of one thing; we had chosen the right grate to crawl up through.
The damp soles of my shoes squeaked on the shower tiles of the old locker room. It made perfect sense, no one had any need to go in there, and it was easy to lock someone in. Not to mention, there were no cameras in the locker room, if the night watch actually checked the feed. I poked my head around a row of lockers and saw the Trifecta.
"Oy Princesses, let's get you out of this tower!"
Kellen's eyes widened when he saw me and he shook Leon violently to wake him. Jackson, who was closest to me, dropped the broken locker door he held as a weapon and pulled me into a hug. What the what?
"What's going on, Love?"
I shoved Jackson off me as I answered Eddie. "I got them, Hawk-Eye!"
"Who are you talking to?" Jackson eyed me with skepticism.
Eddie's tinny voice suddenly ranted at me for going solo and I flicked the earpiece off. "You guys want to get out of here, or what?" I asked.
"Yeah," Kellen said. "But, what are you doing here?"
"Vivienne told us no one was looking for us," Leon mumbled sleepily.
"Their intel said you guys were waiting on orders."
I scoffed at Jackson, "They are. I wasn't."
"So, you...?" Kellen's eyebrows flew upwards.
I flicked my earpiece back on, ignoring his surprise. "Alright, Hawk-Eye, we're ready to get out of here. Am I going the same way I came?"
"Yes, Ninja Bitch."
"What happened to Love?" I shoved Leon into the manhole I'd come through. "I liked that one."
"I did too, until you turned me off."
"Sorry, I won't do it again—get in the damn hole will you?"
Kellen scowled at me as he jumped down. In the tunnel, I retraced my steps, the tired Trifecta following like a tail as Eddie and I squabbled through our communicators.
"Keep moving guys." I beckoned the boys onward as we neared the end of the tunnel. "We have food for you at base."
"Base?" Kellen mumbled.
"My room."
"Your room?" He stared at me in a mix of confusion and awe. "Did you do-?"
"Is that Dickhead seriously asking if you did this?" Eddie sniped in my ear. "Who else did it, the flipping tooth fairy?"
In a surprising feat, Thunderbirds rise from the ashes of their demise. Hellhounds run home with their tails tucked.